Our first week in Guatemala has been good and stretching. We have been blessed to be in Puerto Barrios. It is a port city, but the we are not near the water. The water is too polluted to enjoy anyway. But we are in a pretty little neighborhood and surrounded by children and beautiful palm trees. Guatemala is in the midst of working it’s way out of the Third World. Thanks to the North American Trade agreement, American companies are coming to Guatemala and a middle class is developing. It is really funny to drive down the street and see extremely clean fast food restaurants and then to look and see people washing their clothes outside and trash covering the ground. Electricity is very expensive here, so you only use the lights at nigh and you don’t leave them on when you are not in the room. Because of this, it’s hard to tell if some places are open or not because they only turn on what they need. And though we have regular toilets and showers, there is no hot water and you cannot flush the toilet paper! (Correct, ALL toilet paper goes in the trash!) There are six of us girls in a room slightly wider than my first college dorm room. (That’s really small for those who didn’t see it!) We also smell worse than most of the people because we sweat a whole lot more and are still learning how to do our laundry and we don’t wear perfume because we don’t want to attract even more mosquitoes.
We are learning a lot about the people and have been able to get to know some of the staff very well. Guatemalans are very polite and respectful and love a good laugh. They have fast and ready smiles and think it’s crazy that we don’t speak Spanish. We are getting very close to a sweet young lady named Andrea and Pastor Rani. They go with us to most of our ministry sites and speak enough English to help us communicate well enough. We are also getting close to a great young man named Kevin. He has encouraged me quite a bit and made me feel like family. He is fast becoming my new little brother and if it wasn’t for him, I would not be doing as well as I am. Our first Sunday here, Andrea invited us to her and her cousin’s costume birthday party. It was so fun. They have some crazy traditions! In Guatemala, on your birthday, you are woken up at 5:00 am with fireworks and singing and cake! Yep, 5:00 AM! Then at the end of the day, instead of a spanking, you get a bucket of water dumped on you. It was so funny.
We have lots of ministry that we are doing. Our week is going to look somewhat like this: Monday we have prayer and worship here with our ministry hosts, then the orphanage in the afternoon and working with prostitutes that evening. Tuesday we prayer walk through the neighborhood talking to anyone we see, then go to the children’s hospital in the afternoon and church that night. Wednesdays we do praise and worship at a market in town and then work at a nursing home in the afternoon and church in the evening. Thursdays we do praise and worship at one of the local markets, not sure what we will be doing in the afternoon, and then go to a local park and play with kids and talk to the teenagers at night. Fridays we do something as a team to bless the neighborhood. This week we picked up 5 big black garbage sacks full of trash from the side of the road around the ministry in 30 minutes. Some of the people were so proud of us and thankful, but most just thought we were crazy Americans. That afternoon, we went and ministered to the kids that live in the city dump and that evening we had a family time of praise, worship, and fellowship with everyone involved in the ministry.
Personally, I’m still trying to figure out why God sent me on this trip, but it is good. It is hard living in community and I am struggling to adjust at times, but that is all part of the process. For me the hardest part is the constant noise. My ex-husband was very quite and since he left, it’s been even more quite, so the constant noise of music and talking and differing maturity levels, it is sometimes daunting, but it is for all of us and we are learning to adjust and not kill each other. We are also learning what we need to do to be effective and what ministry with such a language barrier means. Keep praying for us as we learn what it means to be missionaries.
I will post pictures soon!
